Japanese Patent Application No. 2001-345068, filed on Nov. 9, 2001, is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.
The present invention relates to a token-operated game machine.
There is known a token pusher game machine as one of token-operated game machines.
Such a token pusher game machine is known in the art, for example, from Japanese Patent Laid-Open Application No. 2001-29643.
The token pusher game machine generally includes a housing, a playfield on which a number of tokens are placed, a pusher moves forward and backward on the playfield, and a balloting board disposed at the upper back of the housing.
In this conventional machine, a token entrance is provided at the top of the housing. A token inserted through the token entrance passes over the balloting board under its own weight. After the token has been balloted by the balloting board, it falls onto the playfield. The token on the playfield is moved by the pusher toward the edge of the playfield and finally dropped under its own weight into a payout port provided at the bottom of the housing.
The game in such a token pusher game machine was troublesome since the token entrance and payout port are respectively located on the top and bottom of the housing. In such an arrangement, a player has to crouch to take tokens from the lower payout port and then stand up or reach out to insert tokens into the entrance. Such operations are required to be repeated during the game, causing the game to be halted, and it is too much bother for the player to repeat such motions.
Furthermore, since the player has to make sure of the entrance position, he or she is forced to look away from the balloting board, causing the game to be halted again.
(1) According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a token-operated game machine for playing a game by inserting a token to a token entrance and paying out a token based on the game result, the token-operated game machine comprising:
a token receiving section for receiving paid-out tokens; and
an entryway for slidably moving tokens from the token receiving section to the token entrance.
(2) According to a second aspect of the present invention, there is provided a token-operated game machine for playing a game based on the position of a token which passes over a playing board and paying out a token based on the game result, the token-operated game machine comprising:
a token receiving section for receiving paid-out tokens; and
an entryway for slidably moving tokens from the token receiving section to the token entrance.
(3) According to a third aspect of the present invention, there is provided a token-operated game machine in which a token is inserted through a token entrance to drop a token from a playfield and pay out a token, the token-operated game machine comprising:
a token receiving section for receiving paid-out tokens; and
an entryway for slidably moving tokens from the token receiving section to the token entrance.